As a Kid I Thought Odisha is Just About Coasts | A Photostory

When the text books were colorful and all about pictures, I thought Odisha is all about coasts and fisherman. I thought of it as a state where the language is much similar to my own mother tongue in Assamese but the culture and tradition completely different. 2 years of living in Odisha had made me rethink about all that I believed.

I had seen images so beautiful I thought I would never put the camera down. So many stories slowly unfolded; people with unique smiles, villages with history and mountains that hold beauty.

Village Padelguda in Kalahandi district of Odisha photographed from atop a hill. (Photography by author)

I had seen images so beautiful I thought I would never put the camera down. So many stories slowly unfolded; people with unique smiles, villages with history and mountains that hold beauty.

A sunset photographed from a village named Khumjhor in Kalahandi district.

In the 2 years I have been here, I have climbed mountains countless. I have seen the tress change colors with season. The forest like a canvas of mixed hues.

Autumn colors along the road.

I have climbed mountains to reach villages, to meet people they say indigenous. I have met the Shouras of Gajapati. I have drunk their Khajuri (Toddi), I have eaten their food, listened to their songs and seen their rituals.

Fresh extracted Palm tree juice, a local delicacy.

In Kalahandi, especially in the tribal belts, I had seen people with happy faces and no worries even with the little comfort we don’t even count often. I have seen people with smiles that looked authentic. I have seen what trusts look like in reality; when a mother gives away the newborn in the hands of someone they have seen before.

A grandmother and her crying grandchild.

The nights have given me the sight of beautiful milky way,

The Milky-way photographed from Mohuda campus of Gram Vikas in Odisha.

and even, the frightening sight of a mountain on fire.

A hill-top set on fire by the local tribesmen for shifting cultivation.

I have stayed in villages where a normal phone call is seems too exotic, for these are the villages that the e-life is too slow to reach. Life there is still too fast for a halt. The struggles are not the same as yours and mine.

Views for atop a hill, a point named ‘hello-point’. As the name suggest, this is a point where people come to make call as network connectivity is yet to reach their villages.

I have been stuck in traffic jam that is unique.

A herd of cattle blocks the road. This is the most common point to get stuck in rural Odisha.

In villages, so remote to travel, I have found educated people and villages where not a single child is left behind.

Portrait of a child in her Anganwadi (pre-school) uniform.

I had seen kids build beautiful and tiny boats as a tradition of paying tribute to the fisherman and traders of the past.

A boy holds boats made of banana plant. These boats are set sail on nearby rivers during the Karthik Purnima morning.

I had seen cyclone destroy homes; I have seen people rebuild everything. I have seen how hard they worked.

A woman stands in front of her house which was destroyed during cyclone ‘Titli’.

There are mountains where Cashew grows and I have had the chance of tasting the Cashew apple. ‘Lanka-Ambo’ they call it which literally translate to ‘Chilly-Mango’.

Portrait of a Cashew-farmer. Cashew is a primary source of livelihoods in hilly regions of Gajapati district of Odisha.

The Mahendragiri range as it is known, the highest peak of Odisha, I have had bike-ride through it when the clouds appeared below me.

Views from the Mahendragiri range in Gajapati.

Now as I look back into my gallery, I wonder when would I be photographing the beaches. The beaches are there and people visit them everyday in thousands. But, as a photographer I am yet to do so. I believe the beauty these hills, the tress, the people and their unique practices share have been mouthful for me.

I have seen and experienced all of these not as a photographer but as a person. I have been there and spent time patiently, not expecting frames to fall in front of my eyes.

For anybody on a 1 week trip to Odisha, these all might be a long-shot ( or more) to be seen.

Yes, that makes me happy and proud.

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